


Beautiful Music

by blue_ringed_octopus



Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, Original Work
Genre: F/F, Getting Together, Rescue, Sirens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-27 05:35:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20040760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blue_ringed_octopus/pseuds/blue_ringed_octopus
Summary: A siren saves a woman from drowning.





	Beautiful Music

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JehanetteProuvaire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JehanetteProuvaire/gifts).

I don’t remember my mother or my father, although I know I must have had parents. I don’t remember their names. I don’t remember the name of my sister, either – or whether or not I have more than one sibling.

I don’t remember how long I’ve been confined to this island. It’s not an unpleasant place, and beyond the ring of rocky shoals and ribbons of white sand beaches, there are tree-lined footpaths and meadows filled with flowers. I could fly away and leave the island, of course, technically speaking, but I never do.

I don’t remember how long I’ve been singing to the sailors.

In fact, I hardly remember my own name. I think it might be Peisinoe. Perhaps Thelxiepia? Or is my sister – one of my sisters? – Thelxiepia? I prefer the former name in any case, and so I call myself Pei, just to make things easier.

I _do_ remember Demeter, however. She gave me and my sister – sisters? – our wings and tasked us with the protection of her daughter from the Lord of the Underworld. Tragically, we failed. I remember the curse she laid upon me and my sister – sisters? – like it was yesterday:

Sing to the sailors who attempt to sail past, Demeter said, and lure them too close to the island so that they wreck their ships upon the rocks and drown. We live on the Grain Goddess’s continued sufferance only. If a sailor should someday escape the seduction of our beautiful song and pass our island safely, it will be the death of us.

No choice then. We sing and live, and sailors die.

* * *

They see the wreckage of ships on the shoals. Of course they do. And they know our legend. It’s just that they can’t help themselves.

I’ve heard some of the stories that get told about us. One of the most popular avers that we possess the bodies of beautiful women from the waist up and the tail of a fish from the waist down.

This is not correct. Why do they make this mistake? Something about the scaly legs, perhaps? But we sirens are creatures of the air, not the ocean, and we always have been. Those legends which describe us as songbirds with the faces of women are closer to the truth.

Closer to the truth, I said. But still not quite the truth.

So what is the truth? The truth is that I am mostly woman…mostly woman, that is, save for the feathered wings and scaly talons of a thrush. I can hold tight to pretty much anything when I have grasped it with my talons. Then, with my wings, I can lift whatever it is I have grasped up high into the air.

I am the daughter of gods whose names I cannot remember, after all. I am stronger than I appear.

I don’t know why I do it. I’ve seen so many ships founder; I’ve seen so many sailors die. But _she_ isn’t a sailor; _she_ must be a mere passenger.

I don’t know why I decide to save her from drowning.

* * *

But save her I do. It’s easy. I simply swoop down to where she struggles in the waves, grasp her shoulders with my talons, and lift her up out of the water and high into the sky. Then, away from sight of the sea, in the shelter of one of our island’s flower-filled meadows, I return her safely to earth again.

“Who are you?” she asks, her eyes wide and scared. She knows _what_ I am, evidently, but not _who_.

“I’m Pei.” That’ll do for now, whether or not it’s strictly true.

“Atla,” she says, brushing the tips of her fingers against her chest.

“You should rest, Atla.”

She looks like she would protest, but she is waterlogged and exhausted. I strip her of her clothing and cradle her in my arms like a babe. She allows it. I wrap her in my warm, dry wings. She falls asleep peacefully in my embrace.

My sister – one of my sisters? – is angry. She doesn’t understand why I have let the mortal woman live.

“We are mortal too,” I remind her.

“She is dangerous. If she survives, she could leave the island, and our lives will be forfeit to Demeter.” Her voice is a squawk, unbecoming, and it makes the woman asleep in my arms whimper and cough in her sleep.

“You are disturbing her.” I say. “Leave.”

“Do not let her leave.”

I hear the admonition, but I do not know what to think. I rock the woman and sing softly into her ear. She sighs.

* * *

I tend Atla and feed her, and she regains her strength gradually.

There are edible fruits, nuts, and tubers. There are crustaceans and shellfish on the beach. I bring her fat fish to grill over a fire from the sea.

She has no wings nor boat to carry her from the island. She cannot leave, but she does not ask to.

She likes my wings. Her fingers flit and dance between the shafts of the feathers. She rubs her cheek against the down.

She loves my song. She will listen, rapt, entranced, for unbroken hours.

She is beautiful, I realize gradually. The symmetry of her face, the bow of her lips, the apple curves of her breasts, the flat plane of her belly…the…the…the smooth, unbroken flesh of her legs and feet with their five short, talon-less toes…

I don’t remember the first time we kiss. It’s what we both want. Our bodies intertwine, and we writhe against each other. Our nipples brush together, and our bellies. When her fingers find my center, the climax feels like flying.

Perhaps this is how mortals fly. We make beautiful music together.

I wrap my wings around her afterwards as we doze. There is no hurry. There are no ships on the horizon.

“You cannot leave this island. I’m sorry, Atla,” I say.

“I know,” Atla replies. “It’s all right. I would have died, otherwise.”

She hasn’t left me yet, and still, I live to sing my siren’s song.


End file.
